BUSTED—SOAP SIGNS—WALKING—THE TWO ACTORS—FREE THEATRES—JUMPING BILLS—THE
OTHER FAKIR—PEN SCHEME—STREET TALK—THE FRIENDLY HAYSTACK.
Every man who has ever rustled on the road has had his experiences with
that peculiar disease known as shortness of cash. I believe I have been
“busted” more times than any other man on earth; and I am sure that the
disease never elsewhere struck me with half the stunning force then it
did when adrift and alone in the streets of Davenport.
It was positively my first experience of the kind. At home it was
nothing strange to have an empty pocket from one week’s end to another;
but what of that? Board was free, and a roof-tree overhead, while the
paternal pocket was ready to respond to any demands within reason. In
Chicago my finances had been perilously near to low water mark, but that
needed to cause no uneasiness. A walk of a day and I could be feasting
on the fatted calf.
But to be stranded in Davenport was a different matter. I remember, in
the midst of my troubles, there popped into my head an old couplet,
learned in my days at the public school:
“Take heart, nor of the laws of fate complain; Though now it be cloudy,
it will clear up again.”
With that in my mind I took on a moral brace and marched down the
street, willing to meet fate half way, and looking for something to do
that might show a profit, however small.
I found it.
Had I not been cut out by nature, and the special design of Providence
for the vocation which I have so successfully followed, it is more than
likely I would have sat down, with my head on my hands, and wept. I
confess I felt like it for a moment. When I had resolutely thrust such
weakness out of my mind, and taken a calmer view of the situation, I saw
a glimmer of light ahead.
A miserably written placard in a store window furnished the inspiration.
In my early school days if there was any one thing I excelled in it was
penmanship, and with decent opportunity, and a propulsion in such
direction, I might have made a fair draughtsman, or a very decent sign
painter. Whether I would have made a fortune or not is another question.
At this moment of distress I remembered some “work” I had seen done in
Chicago by a traveling “artist,” and that for the sake of amusement I
had tried my hand at it for an hour. I went back to the hotel, and
begged or borrowed a piece of soap. Then I worked store after store for
sign work, promising to put up a magnificent one on each window, done in
soap froth, for the inconsiderable sum of ten cents.
The thing was new to the most of them, and perhaps curiosity helped me.
I was curious myself to know what I could do; and am not sure whether I
was glad or sorry when the first merchant told me to fall to work.
But at it I went. A dozen strokes gave me confidence, and half a dozen
jobs gave me skill. I made one dollar during the rest of the day, and
two and a half the next. I lived on crackers and cheese the whole time,
and cleaned the windows of a livery barn for permission to sleep in the
office. The third day I had apparently exhausted the field, business
fell off, and I determined to leave the town.
First, I went to the hospital, to take leave of Mr. Carlysle, and tried
to force on him a share of my earnings. He refused, as at present he was
well taken care of, and expected a small remittance in a few days, when
he hoped to be sufficiently recovered to leave the city and attend to
some business which would probably net him a little money. Bidding him
good-bye, I slung my budget on my back and took to the ties, without any
fair idea of where I was going or what I should do. I had a cash capital
of three or four dollars in my pocket, and the art of making soap-foam
signs at my fingers’ ends. I had also heard of a pressing want for
laborers in a construction gang which was working on an intersecting
railroad, and if the worst came to the worst I was able to handle a
shovel or pick against the best of them. I was not brought up on a farm
for nothing.
The sign business stayed with me fairly well. Even the smallest towns
were willing to pay for an exhibition of my skill, and hard times soon
developed a faculty for economical living. I cleared my expenses, at
least, and some days did a trifle more. Of course, this was better than
nothing, but was not satisfactory to my ambition. At such a rate fortune
was a long way off, and it seemed to me the time was about ripe for
something else, even though it should turn out to be no better.
When I once began to look about me it was not long before the something
else turned up. I followed the railroad track, to make sure of good
walking, and on the ties one morning I fell in with a couple of actors,
whose finances were even at a lower ebb than mine. They were all-round
variety people, and had their musical instruments with them, but there
was not a cent of money in the whole outfit.
It did not take long for us to fraternize, especially as I carried a
store of cold victuals which, at a pinch, might serve as a lunch for all
of us. At noon we stopped at a spring in the shade of the woods, and,
after making a moderate meal, put our heads together in a consultation
as to the future.
The men were somewhat acquainted with this part of the country, and
spoke of a small town a short distance ahead, where a hall could be
obtained at a very moderate expense. We decided, if possible, to arrange
for the use of this hall on sharing terms, and give a grand, free
entertainment, to be interspersed with a collection.
We all “managed” the venture. By this time I had rubbed off quite a
large percentage of the moss with which I was ornamented when first
making my entrance into public life, and had wit enough to conceal a
total ignorance of the show business and its possibilities. We arranged
for the hall, on the percentage plan, and advertised ourselves by a
little playing and singing on the street, an occasional blast from the
horn that one of the party could really use in a rather creditable
manner, and an announcement which I made at the top of my voice, and as
near after the manner of a side-show “blower,” as I knew how:
“Free entertainment this evening at eight thirty, at Bixley’s Hall. Fun
by the barrel and music by the cord. Singing and dancing by the world
renowned Milton Brothers, and an afterpiece that will split your side.
Leave your buttons at home if you don’t want them busted; and don’t get
your measure taken for a new suit of clothes until the show is over. You
are bound to laugh and grow fat.”
This, and other nonsense, I howled out at the top of my voice, and
before I had been at it a quarter of an hour “the Milton Brothers”
wanted to know with what show I had last been hitting the road. They had
a curiosity to know who else was stranded. You may be certain I did not
give myself away, and yet I returned a fairly satisfactory answer.
Had we charged even a nickel I doubt if we could have drummed up the
skeleton of an audience; but for a free entertainment—it was immense.
The people came in crowds, and responded nobly when the “deacon” passed
the hat.
There is all the difference in the world in towns and the crowds you
gather in them. This crowd was willing to be amused, came to be amused,
and had made up its mind not to be disappointed. They were with us from
start to finish, and when we “counted up the house” found the collection
amounted to within a fraction of twenty dollars. After paying for the
hall, and some little incidental expenses, we had remaining about three
dollars and a half apiece, and a large stock of confidence in the
future.
That party was a wise one in its day and generation. The weather was
delightful, the roads good, the moon near to full; for these reasons,
and others, we took a promenade after the show was out. In other words,
we saved the expense of a hotel bill, and went on to the next town,
getting what rest we wanted in a friendly haystack along the road. While
the Milton Brothers’ combination lasted we paid the hotels less money,
and lived better, than I had thought possible. We had generally got in
too late for dinner, and an order for supper was enough to insure the
moral support of the landlord. Probably he was disappointed that he did
not see the color of our money, but that was no matter.
The business was grand while it lasted, and I continued to be a showman
for some time. We went from town to town, walking when the distance was
not too great, riding in box-cars sometimes, giving entertainments
similar to the first, occupying halls when we could get them, but
content with an empty store or dining room in the hotel at which we
temporarily stopped. Sometimes, of course, there was very little profit,
but oftener there was a fair dividend. Before long we had accumulated at
least twenty dollars apiece. Passing through a large town, we succeeded
in getting hold of a quantity of old lithographs and pictorial sheets.
With these posters and a few small streamers and dodgers we billed a
smaller town not far away for a “Grand Theatrical Entertainment,”
charging regular prices of admission.
Success was with us. After counting up the house, and deducting
expenses, we found we were on the sunny side of fifty dollars.
Such a result as this was too much for us. We began to think that our
time had come. Bob Milton talked of telegraphing for “people” to join us
on ahead; and all of us figured up the cost of putting a show on the
road that would carry eight or ten actors, and play the larger towns.
Had I even imagined myself born to the buskin, I suppose I would have
taken up with the idea as enthusiastically as anyone. Fortunately, the
footlights had never cast their glamour over me, and I had always
regarded this venture as a makeshift and a stepping-stone. When I had
done a few sums in addition, subtraction, multiplication and division, I
suggested that the time was hardly ripe for such a scheme. We were doing
very well as it was, among the smaller towns, where theatres had no
season, and the population could not, and would not, support a regular
company. As for playing the larger towns, I did not believe it could be
done for a month yet; and, meanwhile, if we tried it, we would have
abundant opportunity to drop our little capital and become hopelessly
involved. I thought it would be the part of wisdom to keep on as we had
been doing, playing on velvet, and week by week adding to our slender
store; otherwise, I thought I could retire from the show business.
To this view the boys finally and grumblingly consented, after having
obtained my consent, by way of compromise, to hiring a hall at a
fair-sized town not far away, and trying again the racket of a fine
entertainment.
I think I had a presentment of failure, and presentments are not things
to be trifled with. Surely, nothing ever fell quite so flat as that
night’s work. We had to procure a license, we had to put up five dollars
in advance on the hall rent, our hotel bill was of respectable
proportions, there were other incidental expenses—and we gave no show at
all. There was no gang at the door that night, no rush for the front
seats, no audience, no money, no nothing. A dozen boys and men presented
themselves at the door, but the most of them were dead-heads. They filed
dismally into the hall, and filed more dismally out again. The “house
remained dark” after all. The Miltons concluded that it was more
profitable to dismiss the audience and immediately “skip by the light of
the moon” than to remain and wrestle with such complications as the
balance of the hall rent, the hotel bill, and other like troubles which
fate might send them.
Though the venture had made considerable inroad on our capital, I cannot
say that I was particularly cast down, being full of that exhilaration
which comes from the ability and the right to say, “I told you so.” I
objected, moreover, to the shirking of a bill which we had the means to
pay without its causing us any serious financial embarrassment. Also, I
was interested in the possible cause of our failure, which was a street
fakir, whose harangue I had heard from the doorway of the hall, where I
was in attendance.
Up to this time any little efforts I had made upon the lines which I
have so long followed with such great success, had been addressed to the
individual rather than to the crowd. I had heard street talkers, to be
sure, but had never analyzed their methods, or thought seriously of
following the profession.
I had wit of my own, however, and from the moment this fellow set up his
stand I recognized the finger of destiny, and made the most of my
opportunity. He was an orator in his way, and I can not do better here
than to give the sum and substance of a discourse which put much money
in his purse, and wrecked the Milton Theatrical Combination.
He was selling pens.
The article was good enough of its kind, and one probably familiar to
the reader. It was brass, but looked like gold, and so flexible that it
could stand any sort of abuse, except continuous writing, without being
harmed in the least.
He had his little folding, three-legged stand, a torch, and a rough
piece of board. He would rub the point of the pen up and down and jab it
into the rough surface of the board, spread the points apart, put them
together again, and then, filling it with ink, write and shade as
artistically as you please. All the time he was so maltreating the poor
pen he was keeping up a running fire of talk:
“Hey there, everybody! Come right this way. There is plenty of time. The
show won’t open for half an hour, and meanwhile I want the chance to do
you good. I would like to give away lots of money—fives, tens, twenties,
fifties—everything up to a hundred dollar bill. I’m a down-town, Eastern
Yankee millionaire, and I’ve got more money than I know what to do with.
If you’ll lend me your attention for a few moments I’ll make every
mother’s son of you rich and happy—in your mind at least.
“Here is a little article known as the automatic, Goldentine pen. It
reads, writes and talks in sixty-four different languages, and is one of
the handiest little articles you ever gazed on.
“It is small, gentlemen, but one of the toughest little staples that was
ever brought into the world to bless mankind.
“In the first place, I will ask some gentleman from the audience to
select a pen from the box. Any one in the lot will do. They are all
exactly alike, so it makes no difference which one you take. Ah, thank
you, sir. Now, I will take this pen, place it in this handsome
penholder, and then rub the point up and down on this rough, pine board,
in this manner, just as you would a stick. That should be a good enough
test to convince anyone, but we will not stop at that. I’ll take the
little pen and stick it into the board, just as though it was a
knife-blade. And not only that. I’ll take the little points of the pen
and bend them apart till they have the appearance of just getting over a
drunk.
“I know it looks hard to so abuse a little thing like this—but like a
careful curator, we’ll just place the points back in their original
position like this, stick the little pen in the ink like that, just as
though nothing had ever happened to it. There is its work on the paper.
You saw it done or you wouldn’t have believed it. Is it not beautiful?
The lines are fine enough, and graceful enough, to satisfy the dreams of
an artist—‘fair as the sun, clear as the moon, gentlemen, and beautiful
as an army with banners.’
“If you want to write cross-eyed, or left-handed, it works just the
same; and when it comes to German, French, Spanish, Danish, Irish,
Scotch, Latin or Choctaw, the employment is identical. If you wish to
come up and try before you buy, you are at perfect liberty to do so.
“I have here, also, a stock of beautiful silver-nickel penholders, that
cost you a quarter the world over, and I couldn’t sell them to you at
any less. As a special inducement for your patronage, I’ll make this
proposition:
“Every man who buys a box of pens, one dozen in a box, gets two of these
elegant holders, free, gratis, without cost or consideration. Who is the
first man to pass up a quarter?
“Hurry up, gentlemen, I’ve only got about ten more minutes to talk to
you before the show begins.” (The wretch was perhaps postponing the
beginning of that show until the outer end of eternity, for there was a
suspicion in the crowd that he belonged to it, and that nothing would be
done in the hall until he ceased talking outside.) “If you came to me
after that and offered me fifty dollars for a single pen I wouldn’t sell
to you. Live and let live is my motto, and I never would do anything to
interfere with another man’s business. It is probably the first, last
and only time in your lives that you will have the chance to buy the
Automatic, Indestructible, Goldentine Pen at any such figures, and if
you go to your jeweler he will charge you a dollar and a half or two
dollars for an article not half so good. Where are—ah, yes. Here they
come, here they come. Don’t crowd so, my friends, I’ll get around to you
all by and by.”
That was the substance of his opening oration, but he had jokes by the
dozen and could hold the crowd at will. I am not sure but that the first
purchasers were dummies, as the boys who came and broke the ice had a
sheepish look; but the ice was fairly broken, and for quite a while he
drove a roaring trade.
By the time I had got from under his hypnotic spell, my late companions
were a mile or more out of town, and I was once more free to follow my
own inclination and devices.
What of that? This time I was not busted, and I saw glimpses of a
promising land ahead.
[Illustration]
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